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[Sutopia]

Bounties demonstrate game world rotating around player in too obvious manner.

Ez fix: low chance running into random "bounty" fleet that is "improper" for your fleet that authority decided NOT telling you about it.
I wouldn't mind random "SODDI"(some other dude did it) approach from time to time that "YOUR" bounty getting wiped by other AI ppl "accidentally", just as you can run into others' ones.
AGAIN, this can make bad randomness for unlucky players getting their fleet wiped, facing 3 capitals when they're still struggling growing with like 3 cruisers for example; or waste 10k fuel just to find their prey dead.

[Megas]

I dislike level scaling in Starsector now because it is too fast.  I level up faster than I can get more ships and weapons.  (I reach level 40 while still limited to pirate Eagle and Dominator clunkers and Open Market weapons, no way ready for max level deserter fleets.)  It was toned down slightly last release, but not enough.  It was better without the level scaling in the first 0.8 and before.  I read that it will be tweaked again so that level scaling will not be as ridiculous.  (Max level 5 from level scaling alone.)

As for bounties in general, they require significant resources (fuel and supplies) to travel to.  Having kill-steals is a huge blow.  Early game, player is living from paycheck to paycheck, or bounty to bounty.  Before 0.8, bounties were fairly close, and kill steals were not a problem.  Now, bounties are far away and need lots of fuel and supplies to reach with a proper war fleet.

[Serenitis]

Thinking back to the newbie experience, there is a way you could extend the tutorial to cover in-sector survival.
Currently the tutorial has you clear out of Galatia and deliver a message to Corvus, then you get some text and are left to fend for yourself.
Right there, on delivery of that message there is the opportunity to offer some additional guidance to show the player how to make money and accumulate fuel & supplies.
Upon accepting said offer, a few suitable missions could be generated as needed to walk the player through what kind of missions they need to look for and where, and what they need to do in order to complete them.
Maybe have the player take one kind of mission, complete it then return for the next. So they have some idea of what to do, and some experience to help them decide what they prefer.

I dislike level scaling in Starsector now because it is too fast

Kind of agree. But just ditch level caps entirely tbh.
With the current scaling it's hard to go much past 60 anyway (unless you play literally all day every day). And letting the player accumulate a few extra skills for putting that kind of effort/time in is not exactly game breaking.
Even if you got to 96 and unlocked every single skill currently available, it wouldn't give the player enough of an advanatge to roll the game over and become a minor god like previous versions.
tl;dr - remove the hard level cap, and let player patience be the soft cap.

[Megas]

I meant bounty level scaling, not player leveling up.  I like how fast the player levels up.  I do not like how bounties level up faster than I can acquire the money and resources necessary to fight them thanks to level scaling.  Even without level scaling, I could barely keep up with bounty progression.

The point of limited SP is to force specialization.  Unfortunately, level cap is too low (and dead aptitudes is too much of a SP tax), and player is forced to play cheerleader with fleet/campaign skills and have less combat skills than max level officers, who can afford to play (or rather only play as) combat glory hounds.

[cerberusti]

I dislike level scaling in Starsector now because it is too fast.  I level up faster than I can get more ships and weapons.  (I reach level 40 while still limited to pirate Eagle and Dominator clunkers and Open Market weapons, no way ready for max level deserter fleets.)  It was toned down slightly last release, but not enough.  It was better without the level scaling in the first 0.8 and before.  I read that it will be tweaked again so that level scaling will not be as ridiculous.  (Max level 5 from level scaling alone.)

As for bounties in general, they require significant resources (fuel and supplies) to travel to.  Having kill-steals is a huge blow.  Early game, player is living from paycheck to paycheck, or bounty to bounty.  Before 0.8, bounties were fairly close, and kill steals were not a problem.  Now, bounties are far away and need lots of fuel and supplies to reach with a proper war fleet.

It is very fast.  Last time I played I came back from my first trip out at max level, with loads of cash.  I had access to buy basically nothing.  It was not even like I barely hit it, I hit it before I even started the return trip, and the amount of real time was very low.  I think I liked the soft cap more really, although xp required to level could probably be increased by a factor of 5 or even 10 across the board.

I got a little lucky and with my dram and wolf combo managed to salvage a degraded Sunder, a HIL, and a freighter pretty early on that first survey trip.  From there it was over, domain era anything falls to that ship hard enough that any fleet is fair game, even the larger ones.  I could easily sustain a fleet on combat and other looting (which was not all that small by the time I got back, although also note that I do not even touch the combat talents).

That brings me to the more general topic of difficulty and balance.  This is going to be highly subjective because the game has a high skill cap, and there is a fair amount to know on top of it.  Some of us have been playing for quite a while off and on.  If you give me a sunder, a HIL, and a sector of the map which is full of unshielded craft, I am aware that I have won the game for all intents and purposes. 

A new player would not know that, and probably would not push out at that point.  They may not even try that combo.  If they did, the required precision piloting may cause them some issues.  The game has been in development long enough that things which pose a minor challenge to many players can be a serious challenge for someone new to it.  I imagine it can be pretty brutal, especially if you are expecting to just go in and kill everything every time without breaking a sweat, as in so many games.

[Megas]

Leveling up really slows down by 50, but we cannot get that high anymore.  That is fine if 42 points were enough.  (They are not with aptitudes sucking too many away.)

First time I played 0.8, when level scaling was not yet in, I did not need to do survey missions.  (My experience with the game since the last 0.54 days helped...)

Now, I need to do missions because level scaling makes bounties level up too fast.  I finish the campaign tutorial, take my first bounty, and the pirate fleet is already a match due to so many ships.  After few more bounties, new bounties have two or three pirate cruisers and more escorts than my entire fleet, which is simply too much.  All of the bounties are like that.

If I do not take commission, I cannot buy much.  If I take a commission, I lock myself out of various useful markets I can return to from fringe worlds (meaning I may need more fuel to return to a core world that does not want me dead).

[frogbones]

  After the tutorial section, you're dumped off into the deep end with few safety mechanics. 

...and THIS is what I love......."the deep end".....swim....doggy paddle...float, whatever you have to do to not sink. Oh and the Mods....so sweet

[Silkdawn]

I can see your problems as a first timer, but for some of us, this is EXACTLY what we want. In my case as an old time player of games like Pirates and Elite (pretty sure the developer have played thoose.) In short it can take a few tries to make things work for you, but it also makes it so much more enjoyable when youre not pushed into a certain path by the game. Do as you wish and trust me, do as you wish actually works with this game, but it can also be extremly hard if chose some paths that is a bit specific.

Theres obviously the easier way of doing things, but as you learn the game its also fun doing those specific things and the game lets you. Theres few games around these days that let you do that.

See it more as a simulator where it makes sense not to bite a bigger fish than yourself. Until youre the bigger fish.